


the sugar shy fool of sugar town

by tinygumdrops (curryramyeon)



Category: EXO (Band)
Genre: Adventure, Alternative Universe - Backpacking Trip, Childhood Friends, Friendship, Love, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-13
Updated: 2019-09-13
Packaged: 2020-10-17 20:17:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,933
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20626955
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/curryramyeon/pseuds/tinygumdrops
Summary: Kyungsoo goes on a backpacking trip. Despite everything, Chanyeol comes along.





	the sugar shy fool of sugar town

**Author's Note:**

> one day, i just remembered—kyungsoo wanted to be a farmer. and to go on a backpacking trip. how can i forsake the tiny dude such wishes? and so this silly thing happened.
> 
> hope you'll all enjoy!

_Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. _

_It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres._

-1 Corinthians 13:4-7, New International Version (NIV)

~O~

The sun has almost risen when Kyungsoo decides to go away for a few days. After feeding the chickens at five in the morning, he returns to his house and starts packing for his trip.

He’s reheating his first batch of steamed red bean buns when his mother calls.

“I’ll be going away for a few hours,” Kyungsoo tells his mother. He then puts it on speaker so he can move around.

“Away?”

“Yes.”

“Where?”

“Oh, I don’t know yet. Just somewhere.”

His mother turns silent, thinking. Kyungsoo is almost finished heating and wrapping the buns with a cotton cloth when she speaks again, “Tell me where you’ll go when you’ve decided.”

“Okay.”

“Bring an umbrella just in case it rains,” Mother instructs. “You can use it for other stuff too. Like for warding off stray dogs. There will probably be more rabid ones because of the heat.”

Maybe it’s a warmer autumn in Seoul this year; there’s not exactly any heat this time around in Seoltang-myeon. Also, Kyungsoo would rather like it if stray dogs approached him. “I will,” he says, however.

“Will you be alone?”

“Yes.”

“Would you like me to call your brother? See if Seongsoo’s free!”

“I don’t want to be a bother. It’s kind of sudden to ask him, besides. I’d prefer to go on my own.”

“But you’re always...” She sighs. “Oh, well. Tell me when you get to wherever you’ll be going, then. Eat well!”

“I will.” After washing his hands, Kyungsoo ends the call.

...

He’s almost done stuffing his bag with extra clothes when his neighbor Chanyeol comes knocking.

Kyungsoo sidekicks Chanyeol’s rear. “It’s rude to barge in someone’s home unannounced,” he chides as he returns to his bedroom. “How many times do I have to tell you?”

“You’re no unmarried Joseon court lady,” Chanyeol says, closing the door behind him. “What’s a twenty-nine-year-old twenty-first century bachelor supposed to be doing at seven in the morning that merits no impromptu visits from yours truly?”

“I can give you a thousand reasons,” Kyungsoo says under his breath as he squeezes a pair of clean slippers in his bag.

“I bought you clementines!” Chanyeol says, his gleeful voice sounding like it came from the kitchen. “Seedless ones!”

“Yeah?”

“Heekyung noona got boxes from her ex-boyfriend. So many of them! She didn’t know what to do with ‘em, so I got myself one.”

Kyungsoo wonders if he can still fit his sandals in his rucksack. He tries rolling two of his shirts tighter and manages to stuff a pair in the laptop flap of his bag.

“I gave you fifteen. It’s in a black grocery bag—I put it on your dining table. Kyungsoo? Do Kyungsoo-ssi? Hey, Kyungsoo? Jeez... answer me when I’m talking to you, asshole. What exactly are you doing in there, anyway?” The door swings wider as Chanyeol steps in his room. “You going somewhere?”

Kyungsoo pulls the zipper up. “Yeah.”

“Where?”

“Maybe somewhere where the weather’s nice.”

“It’s the middle of autumn here.”

Kyungsoo sighs. “It means I don’t know yet,” he says. “I just want to go backpacking for a bit.”

“Why?”

“I haven’t done it in a while.”

“What? Traveling?”

Kyungsoo shakes his head. “Doing something that’ll make me sweat. Like _really_ sweat.”

Chanyeol looks at him incredulously. “You’re a farmer,” he points out.

“... Right.”

Chanyeol frowns. His whole face changes when he does it, his demeanor becoming darker, more serious—it’s almost threatening. It’s one thing that’s distinctively Park Chanyeol: whenever his mood shifts, the air around him follows suit.

“If you’re looking for a valid reason for me to give you,” Kyungsoo says. “I don’t think I have one. I just want to.”

“Want?” Chanyeol questions. “Not need?”

Kyungsoo considers it. “Need,” he finally decides.

Sensing Kyungsoo’s honesty, Chanyeol’s mood lifts. He leans on the door frame in one suave move that makes Kyungsoo wonder just how many times his friend practiced it in front of the mirror when he’s by himself. “I learned this English word a few months back—if I remember correctly, it was ‘wanderlust’,” Chanyeol says with a smile. “I think it describes what you have! Perfectly!”

“Maybe.” Kyungsoo can look it up when he comes back. “Can you mind Biba and the chickens for me? And thanks for the fruits. I’ll take some of them with me. I can pay you when I get back.”

Chanyeol frowns again. “Don’t be like this, Kyungsoo.”

“Be like what?” Kyungsoo zips up his windbreaker. He’s losing daylight. He needs to be on his way.

Chanyeol stands at full height. “I’ll come with you!” he says.

“What?”

“I’ll come with you!” He’s too loud for the hour.

“Why do you want to go?” Kyungsoo wearily asks.

“I don’t have any valid reasons.”

“Bastard,” Kyungsoo mutters.

Chanyeol claps his hands, almost rhythmically, snickering all the while. “Well, see, I’ve been asking you to come with me to go on a trip for _ages_. You were always—” he slouches and bugs his eyes out, “—’I’ll think about it’, but you’ve never given me a proper answer!” He smiles. “You never really wanted to go elsewhere, did you?”

“It had gotten busy.”

“So now’s the time!”

“For?”

“A trip!” Chanyeol blusters. “I’ll come with you!”

Kyungsoo has to make it clear: “I don’t need you to come with me.”

Chanyeol laughs again. “Jeez, of course I know that! Are you not Do Kyungsoo?” he says. “And _I’m_ Park Chanyeol. I just _want_ to.”

Kyungsoo regards him. “Okay,” he relents after a minute. “Go pack your stuff. Quickly.” He hefts his bag with a _harrumph_. “Just don’t make a ton of noise as we go.”

Grinning widely, Chanyeol salutes him. “Roger.”

...

Inevitably, Chanyeol makes a ton of noise. The sandals he wears are one of those thick-soled, expensive kinds that make a loud pitter-patter as he goes. His huge travel bag has several keychains dangling on each slider, clanging together whenever Chanyeol takes a step.

“This is _fun_! This is _fun_!” Chanyeol says in between his mindless chatter. “Isn’t this fun, Kyungsoo?”

“I suppose.” Kyungsoo has never understood why Chanyeol ever sees the need to announce whatever banal sentiment he feels at the moment. It’s over the top, not to mention unnecessary, to declare things as they happen. To avoid ruining the moment, why not just allow things to unfold naturally?

_Naturally_. Kyungsoo bites back a laugh. If Chanyeol or Jongdae ever heard him say words like that out loud, they’d waste no time making fun of him. Jongdae would be less mean about it, though.

Still, that doesn’t mean Kyungsoo disagrees with him. It is fun.

Chanyeol repeats, “This is _fun_!“

“Quit shouting. You sound like you’re forcing yourself,” Kyungsoo grouses. “It’s embarrassing.”

“I’m expressing the joy of being outdoors. Which I’m _sure_ we both feel,” Chanyeol says. “I’m expressing it enough for the both of us.”

“Who says there’s a need?”

“Mother Nature wants to hear that she’s being appreciated. Don’t you like being told that you’re appreciated?”

“Not like a Gregorian chant, I don’t.”

Chanyeol chuckles. “For someone whose livelihood involves a ton of physical labor, you sure are getting winded pretty fast.”

Kyungsoo wants to object, but his breaths are coming in whistles at the moment. He settles with a well-aimed glare that makes Chanyeol laugh even louder. “The air is pretty... thin,” Kyungsoo explains blandly.

They follow the dirt path that leads to the exit of the village. Sparrows circle the nearby trees, flying close then away, then back again at the canopies. At this hour of morning calm, the skies are a stunning azure color.

Chanyeol speaks up, “You know where we’re going?”

It takes almost four minutes before Kyungsoo can respond. “I have an... inkling.”

“An inkling.”

“Correct.”

“Have you actually planned this? To a t?”

“No,” Kyungsoo admits.

“_Really_?” Chanyeol says.

“Yes.”

The path has several puddles; since it hadn’t rained last night, it probably came from the ongoing irrigation construction for the rice fields. Chanyeol, with his expensive footwear, tries to sidestep them. Kyungsoo goes straight on easily, doesn’t bother evading each one he comes across.

For a while, there’s nothing but the bird calls and the sandal stomping and the keychain clanging, and then there comes the unmistakable sound of someone smacking his lips. “You’re acting really unusual, Do Kyungsoo-ssi.”

Kyungsoo sniffs. “Am I?”

“You are.”

“It was a rhetorical question.”

“Rhethoric is for cowards. Each question deserves an answer.”

“You’re so full of shit.”

Chanyeol laughs. “Just fine use of sophistry, my friend.”

Kyungsoo knows he hasn’t been himself lately. His energy has been quite down, more so than usual. Gravity seems more than a pull, these days—it makes Kyungsoo’s body feel like it weighs a hundred kilograms heavier. And this morning, when he woke up, he didn’t feel like getting up from his bed and tending the garden, feeding the chickens, working in the sugar house. He didn’t want to do anything at all.

Like a phantom, he wanted to be adrift from it all.

Sweating profusely, Kyungsoo had sat up straight in his bed in horror at that fleeting thought.

“You sure do needed this trip,” Chanyeol says, putting it out there again.

Kyungsoo mentally tacks an affirmative to that statement.

“How long are we taking this trip?”

“Dunno.”

“_Seriously?_”

Kyungsoo grunts as a response.

“All right. So how about we go for two days? I think I need to get back by Thursday... Right, I still have Hyohun-sunbae’s persimmons to pick up...”

“Okay.”

“Are we on a no mobile phone policy?”

“Not really.”

“I’ll look for places we can go then!” Chanyeol says.

_Please do_, Kyungsoo thinks.

...

Chanyeol decides on a mushroom picking spot that’s near an oyster farm. _Two birds with one stone_, he tells Kyungsoo proudly.

To get to the site, they have to trek about four kilometers up a sloping hill, where a dense forest with teeming undergrowth resides. This time of the season seems to be the best for mushroom hunting: the vegetation would have thinned a little, and the golden leaves that cover the soil make for a variety of fungi, and are easy enough to clear. Or so Chanyeol says.

“I recently bought this e-book about mushrooms because they were on sale,” Chanyeol says. “I bought it two months ago. Or was it three? And then I bragged about it to my sister—she said she thought I was crazy for buying it. Crazy... _Ha_! Seems like it will be useful after all.”

“Jeez. Why would you even spend on something so—”

“Well, why wouldn’t I?”

Kyungsoo snorts.

The air has slightly turned chilly that Kyungsoo’s breaths turn into visible puffs whenever he lets them out. His back feels especially damp.

The road alternates between cement and dirt; now, they slowly climb a narrow, dusty gravel path. Before the hike started, he made Chanyeol change into a more suitable footwear. Kyungsoo was fine since he’s already wearing sneakers.

“A man of such fine detail, eh?” Chanyeol had teased earlier as he bent over to tie the shoelaces of his Ferrari-red Reeboks. It looked even more expensive than his sandals.

As they reach a particularly sharp angle in the road, Chanyeol repeats the statement.

“Why?” Kyungsoo mutters. “Why, again?”

“You have an umbrella,” Chanyeol says. “Makes for a pretty useful staff, I gotta say. And you said you just thought of going on a trip this morning.”

Kyungsoo spears the end of his umbrella in the sediment, strong enough to crack a mudstone in half. “My mom said I should bring one,” he divulges.

“Auntie called?”

“Yeah. She called me earlier this morning.”

“Oh! How did it go?”

“I let her know that I was going away for a few days. She wanted me to bring an umbrella with me.”

“Did she say anything about me?”

Kyungsoo laughs. "Why would she, you crazy bastard?

“Ei~ Auntie and I are pretty close. You know that! She cried fat ugly tears when I bid her goodbye that time she and Seongsoo left for Seoul, remember?” Chanyeol says. “She calls me sometimes when you don’t pick up your phone. To check up on you.”

Kyungsoo hangs his head low. “Sorry,” he says.

Chanyeol scoffs. “She sometimes calls when you’re out picking tomatoes or whatever.” He loosens his knitted scarf. “Or when you’re asleep.” He looks over to Kyungsoo. “Don’t worry about it, god. It’s no trouble. You know how mothers are like.”

Kyungsoo knows, especially knows how his mother is like. Kyungsoo can be really tight-lipped if he wants to be, but Chanyeol... “If she calls you again, tell me. Call me over and hand the phone to me or something,” he says.

“What is this? Have I become your lowly page or something?” Chanyeol seems cheered by the idea.

“Who in their right mind would like hearing that their best friend is cozying up to their mothers?” Kyungsoo clicks his tongue. “Just hand over the phone to me, you bastard.”

Chanyeol laughs out loud.

They’ve arrived at the site. The ground is damp, almost totally wet and muddy. At this edge of the forest, the trees are much sparser, so Kyungsoo gets a clear view of the hillside—the clouds are white and fluffy, like the steamed buns he packed this morning. Bright, orange-red fruits crowd within the persimmon trees—they outlined the way up the hill like runway lights, the branches swaying with the autumn wind, graceful. Kyungsoo hadn’t noticed while he was walking down the road, his eyes looking straight ahead.

The song of the birds are crystal clear. Kyungsoo wants to hum along with them, but ultimately decides against it.

When he looks back, Chanyeol is staring at him.

Kyungsoo rubs his shoulders with his gloved hands. “What?” he says. He’s surprised; his voice came out defensive. He almost apologizes.

Chanyeol shakes his head with a smile. “Nothing,” he says. “Let’s get started, shall we? You can recognize the bad ones, right? The toxic ones?”

“Yeah, well. I have an idea. Dad taught me those.”

“Bring out your phone. I sent the field guide to ‘ya.“ Chanyeol waves his own trusty iPhone—the newest model. Kyungsoo can’t remember what it’s called now. “Have you been to this area before?”

“Not frequently.”

“Never been here,” Chanyeol says cheerfully. "So don’t stray too far. I’ll get lost.”

Kyungsoo smirks. “Yes, your majesty.”

Chanyeol claps his hands. A go signal. Kyungsoo holds back a laugh as he opens his phone and browses the mushroom field guide. Knowing his companion, this is a fierce competition for him. Kyungsoo will have to give his all and find whatever he can.

There are clusters of white-capped mushrooms growing on a dead log. There are tiny orange ones as well, emerging from the stout base of what used to be a chestnut tree. An empty shell of a cicada. An ant hill. Stepping in between the fallen aspen trees, Kyungsoo finds a gorgeous amount of wild oysters. He plucks them off one by one and places them inside one of the small, black plastic bags he brought.

Kyungsoo follows a thick patch of moss, then finds a whole bunch of inky cap mushrooms. He gingerly collects as much as he can.

Chanyeol is cheering at a distance. “There’s so many!” he exults. “I’ve never realized!”

Kyungsoo chuckles to himself. How would he realize if he’s never done mushroom foraging before? “You need help identifying them?” he shouts.

Chanyeol walks closer to him. “Why? Do you?” he says, eyebrows raised.

“No. I think I know most of them.” Kyungsoo doesn't need the guide, apparently. “If you want help...”

“Fricking show-off.” Chanyeol shakes his head. “I’ll have you double-check whatever I got, then.”

Kyungsoo shrugs.

Sometimes, Kyungsoo wonders if Chanyeol ever tires of giving everything he’s got in _everything_ he does, and expecting the same level of commitment in other people. Kyungsoo wonders if he ever got tired of feeling disappointed. There aren’t many people who can match Chanyeol’s level of energy and dedication. Surely he should know by now. And yet.

Worst of all, Kyungsoo’s well aware that it’s not his responsibility to make Chanyeol happy, yet he can’t help but want to meet every push and shove. It’s annoying.

That’s why everyone thinks they suit each other well, Kyungsoo figures. They’re _both_ annoying.

There’s a surprised bark of laughter from behind him. Kyungsoo looks up from the ground and cranes his neck to turn to his companion. “What?” he says.

“You look like a garden gnome, slumped over like that,” Chanyeol comments, his eyes and teeth gleaming.

Kyungsoo rolls his eyes. “What do you know about gnomes, trollface?” he mutters. He then hears the sound of a muted click—"Hey!" Kyungsoo yells, flinging a mushroom at Chanyeol. “Quit it while I’m still asking you nicely!”

“No, seriously! Wait, let me just take a picture—”

“Park Chanyeol—”

_Click._

Another round of laughter.

Kyungsoo sighs. “You better delete that or I’ll smother you in your sleep,” he says tiredly.

Chanyeol snorts. “I’m sending this to Auntie.”

“What the hell for?” he grouches.

“You look nice and warm,” Chanyeol says as he looks at his screen. “It’s good.” He then holds up his phone to show Kyungsoo his picture. “I’m doing you a favor. If it weren’t for me letting her know what you’re up to, Auntie will come back here herself, you know.”

Kyungsoo clicks his tongue. “Go talk to your own mom,” he says.

“Why should I, when I’m obviously Auntie’s favorite?”

Kyungsoo averts his gaze, willing to calm himself. When he looks back, Chanyeol is beaming at him smugly.

“I take such good pictures, don’t I?” Chanyeol says. He shows Kyungsoo the photo again and exhales forcefully. “You know... maybe I should have been a pro photographer. Right? I think I got what it takes,” he muses aloud. “Instead of composing elevator music and BGMs, I could make real fucking dough. Meet models and celebrities and stuff.”

“How would that suit you exactly?” Kyungsoo ripostes. “Rather than having a studio, I think you’d be the one begging to be modeling in front of the camera in a matter of minutes.”

“Really?”

Kyungsoo pretends to think about it. “_Seconds_, then.”

Chanyeol laughs. “Because I’m such a darn catch, right? Hey. Don’t you want to be reborn as me in your next life?”

“I’d rather burn in hell a billion times,” Kyungsoo replies blithely.

Chanyeol sighs; Kyungsoo hears contentment there. “You live such a honest, frugal life, my tiny friend,” he says.

~O~

Park Chanyeol and Do Kyungsoo have been friends for twenty-nine years, their families for even far longer. Kyungsoo’s father and Chanyeol’s mother were of the same graduating class in high school, and Kyungsoo’s grandparents and Chanyeol’s grandfather were classmates from elementary school until high school. The grandparents were especially close: they had combined their sugar cane farms when they were in their twenties, and now it’s the biggest producer of sugar in town—which, in a sprightly form of creative resolution, was renamed _Seoltang_ for “sugar”. There even has been talk that Chanyeol’s great, great grandfather and his own great, great grandfather were drinking buddies at some point in their teens. Kyungsoo has not found enough evidence to corroborate that story, though it’s not something he particularly cares to prove untrue. Either way, he and Chanyeol go way, way back, more than enough.

Because of that, Kyungsoo knows that the two of them will be inextricably linked, no matter how far he distances himself from their shared history. Once, Chanyeol tried leaving Seoltang-myeon altogether to get away from Kyungsoo. Yet in a lot of ways, they’re still together. So Kyungsoo doesn’t really bother anymore.

It’s not easy extracting yourself from someone who makes you a little less lonely, after all.

...

Chanyeol’s smarts wasn’t limited to music or books or games. Most of the time, he knew people’s thoughts and emotions better than they could ever know themselves. It was a talent that made Chanyeol truly comfortable in his own skin, even when he’s surrounded by so many people.

He had, of course, known what Kyungsoo would always choose.

And yet, Chanyeol still had the gall to say—

“I like you,” Chanyeol had said to Kyungsoo when they were seventeen, and then again at twenty-three. “I really, really like you.”

To that, Kyungsoo had responded with two hues of a rejection, the second more overt and angrier than the first. It was uncomfortable looking at Chanyeol’s tranquil face afterwards.

“You know how I feel about you,” confused seventeen and irate twenty-three year old Kyungsoo had replied. “You know how I feel about us.”

“Yeah, I do,” Chanyeol had said. “That’s why I’m telling you.”

“I don’t get it.”

“I know.”

“_Why?_”

“Just because.” Chanyeol’s answering tone was cuttingly cool, inexplicably harsh. It was a snippet of how the next few months without Chanyeol would be—the loneliest Kyungsoo had been in his life. As he was, the rest of the villagers attest, already the loneliest man in sugar town, it was a lot to handle.

Kyungsoo still can’t choose which bothers him more: the fact that Chanyeol knew Kyungsoo well enough to know that he would get rejected, or the fact that Chanyeol had used the rejection as a leverage to leave Seoltang-myeon for Seoul. Whatever the reason, Kyungsoo can’t find it in himself to truly forgive the other boy, even if Chanyeol has forgiven or turned a blind eye to Kyungsoo’s transgressions innumerable times.

When intense emotions are involved, Kyungsoo can’t be as kind and as rational as he usually is. That is why he hates it most of all. Intense emotions, not Chanyeol. Never Chanyeol.

“Saying that I ran you out of town... just because I didn’t return your feelings...” Kyungsoo grouched over a generous amount of beers, when Chanyeol had returned five summers ago. “You sure know how to make a person feel terrible for eighteen whole months.”

“I had a chance and I took it,” Chanyeol replied. “You were the perfect scapegoat.”

“Is that all I am to you?”

Chanyeol snorted. “Definitely not. You heard my confession. I wasn’t lying.”

“Whether it was true or not, you left me here alone,” Kyungsoo grumbled as he adjusted his glasses, words slurring. “You were my only friend.”

Chanyeol didn’t say anything for a long time.

“Whether you liked me or not is out of the question,” Kyungsoo spoke again. “Making people believe that I chased you away to the city was rude.”

Chanyeol looked down on his lap. “Sorry.”

“You made me look like a moron to the whole village. It was almost like I was taking your spot.”

Chanyeol cracked a smile and drank the last of his beer.

“Don’t ever leave again,” Kyungsoo said.

Chanyeol looked at him in the eye. “I won’t.”

...

After that night, Chanyeol has never left Kyungsoo’s side.

~O~

They’re setting up camp at the foot of the hill. Chanyeol, with his many previous camping experiences, takes the lead: he props up the tent and makes a fire for them to roast their mushrooms on. Kyungsoo cooks and cleans their utensils.

“Hey, Park Chanyeol?” Kyungsoo begins as he tosses the wild oysters in the small saucepan.

Chanyeol sits and replies after drinking from a bottle of water, “Yeah? What is it?”

Kyungsoo adds two tablespoons of oyster sauce before sprinkling black pepper all over. “Thanks for coming with me today,” he says, sincere.

Chanyeol quickly smiles at him, then turns to the fire. “No problem,” he says.

~O~

After drenching the camp fire with rain water, Kyungsoo and Chanyeol head for the lakeside. A hint of sunshine peeks behind the tall trees of the glade, the fog making the light shimmer at the tips of the canopy. The sight of it makes Kyungsoo sleepy and dazed.

They follow a path bordered with mountain laurels, rhododendrons and yellow lady slippers; although there are bicycle tracks along the mud, the trail looks barely used. The breeze is damp, cool, almost sombre.

“I know!” Chanyeol pipes suddenly. “Oh my god, I think I know what we could do!”

His effervescence makes Kyungsoo a little cautious. “What?”

“We should cook meals from things we find here!” Chanyeol enthuses.

“What?” Kyungsoo repeats.

Chanyeol throws him a look. “You know. Things!” He gestured around him. “Wild vegetables! Herbs! Fruits! Nature! Just like we did last night with the mushrooms and stuff. Authentic campfire cooking! Blast from the past, eh, Kyungsoo?"

“I don’t know,” Kyungsoo says. “Is that, er — safe?”

“Don’t be modest. Between you and me, haven’t you had loads of experience on this already? I wouldn’t have suggested it if it wasn’t safe. For the both of us. Duh.” At Kyungsoo’s unconvinced look, Chanyeol snorts. “I have a field guide on my phone,” he says quite proudly.

Kyungsoo doesn’t bother asking why he has one. “I don’t know...”

“It’s gonna be _fun_! Really, didn’t you do this with your dad a lot?”

“Dad’s remarried,” Kyungsoo says. “He’s gone. For the longest time. I don’t know if I still remember—”

Chanyeol’s not going to budge: “Oh, come on! I thought you would do it, anyway. You even have your portable burner with you! What’s the problem?”

Kyungsoo lowers his head, sighing low. “No, it’s just... Cooking out here is...”

“What? Why?” Chanyeol looks crestfallen. “Is it because of me?”

“No, no. Jeez. Never mind,” Kyungsoo says. “You’re right. It’s a good idea. Let’s do it.”

Chanyeol grimaces. “Jeez. Make it sound like a death mission more, why don’t you?” He grabs the end of Kyungsoo’s umbrella and pokes his thigh with it. He then crows at the skies. “Do Kyungsoo-nim wants a backpacking trip? Let’s give him a backpacking trip of a _lifetime_!”

_No need to be so thoughtful_, Kyungsoo thinks dryly.

After a short trek passing through the thinnest nook of the forest, they stumble upon another clearing, one so large that Kyungsoo’s momentarily stunned by its magnitude. He doesn’t remember the birch trees being so farther out from each other. The villagers piled logs of birch and aspen into pyramids on one corner. Wood that could no longer be used were piled on the other side and left to rot. Before, there was a thick, distinct smell akin to a curious mix of mint, pickled wild bracken and knobweed. Only the mist remains. The place used to be mysterious, more...

“Bizzare,” Chanyeol finishes for him. Kyungsoo hadn’t realized he’s been muttering to himself.

Nevertheless, he agrees. It used to be opulent and lifelike. Now, there are just grass and leaves.

Chanyeol tightens the straps of his backpack. “Kyungsoo, hey. Maybe it’s best if we get a move on. We've only made little distance between us and our last campsite.”

“No need to be so thoughtful,” Kyungsoo, this time, says out loud.

Chanyeol barks a laugh. “No, really. This place gives me the creeps. Let’s get out of here.”

They walk past the dried logs and follow the path leading into the forest. Chanyeol makes idle conversation which Kyungsoo hears and understands in fragments. Chanyeol doesn’t mind Kyungsoo’s inattention most of the time. Oddly enough, he seems to welcome it. There’s a curious, comforting slant to his shoulders when he babbles on about the difficulties of beating himself in setting high scores in his video games, and there’s a wisp of a smile when he shifted to complaining about his pet horse’s cloudy disposition.

After thirty minutes, thirst sets in. They clear out the boulder from its sheath of moss and dried leaves and set their bags on top of it. Kyungsoo takes out his canteen and drinks; the cold water is almost searing in his parched throat. He tosses Chanyeol a red bean bun. Chanyeol talks some more, and Kyungsoo listens, and after a while, an old couple from the neighboring village passes them. They’re on a pilgrimage and dressed to the nines for it. The man announces that they’re celebrating their sixtieth anniversary.

“That’s wonderful!” Chanyeol says in awe. “Wow, and you’ve got a lifetime more to go, isn’t that right?”

“Ha!” the man grins. “You make it sound like a prison sentence. But in a way it kind of is, isn’t it?”

The woman snorts delicately and jabs her husband with a bony finger. “Oh, I have enough of you making me the butt of your jokes. All this nonsense about me being your warden.” She turns to the two conspiratorially. “If only I knew how much I’d have to put up with this old, unfashionable man and all his damned sniveling, I would have divorced him a long time ago!”

The man clucks his tongue. “I’ve been too nice to her,” he says, aggrieved. “Look at how she treats his husband of six decades. See this as an example, young one.” He elbows Chanyeol, chuckling all the while. “Youth isn’t something you should take lightly. You’ve got to make your choices count, you hear?”

“Crystal,” Chanyeol says agreeably.

“Congratulations to the two of you,” Kyungsoo says and bows. “I hope you two continue to be happy and healthy.”

The old couple smiles contentedly. The woman frowns distastefully and succeeds in sharing her opinion on Chanyeol’s ostentatious shoes before the man whisks his wife away in the opposite direction.

After the growing silence between them, Chanyeol suggests they go to the nearby village and get _soju_.

“I’m not hauling your drunken ass out here in the wilderness,” Kyungsoo warns.

“And the lightweight continues to talk,” Chanyeol spears back.

The undergrowth is sparse in this corner of the forest. Kyungsoo supposes that’s why the sound of their footsteps fill the space quickly, making him slightly anxious that their noise would attract unsavory creatures (or characters) that nestle within the grounds. He’s been on this exact trail with his father, years and years ago, but understandably, a sixteen-year-old child wouldn’t be as astute to dangers than should be deemed proper. Kyungsoo suddenly recalls the time he volunteered to come without fail whenever his dad looked for chestnuts in the mountains; he coughs at the memory, abashed at his youthful eagerness.

“What do you think?”

“Huh? About what?” He hasn’t realized Chanyeol had been talking.

Chanyeol quirks an eyebrow. “Marriage.”

Kyungsoo puffs out his cheeks, thinking.

“No need to be so shifty about it, Kyungsoo.”

“I haven’t said anything yet!”

Chanyeol snorts impressively. His whole body seems to rock at the action.

“Well,” Kyungsoo starts out carefully. "I think it’s a, _ah_, good means for people to—erm, declare their love, or something like that."

“So you think it’s fine? Marriage?”

“Perfectly fine,” Kyungsoo says. “I think marriage can be great.”

“Honestly?”

“Honestly.”

“Huh.” Chanyeol goes quiet, and then says, “Marriage seems hard.”

Kyungsoo blows out the air in his lungs. “I suppose it is.”

“I don’t know how the couple from before kept it up for sixty years.”

“Yeah. It’s quite a marvel.”

“But you know what? I might seem crazy for saying this, but dating seems infinitely harder.”

Kyungsoo laughs, startled. “How many blind dates went wrong back in Seoul?” He has a conservative estimate of fifteen, but Chanyeol’s always been a man of surprises.

“I’m a bit traditional with my dating style. I like foxy girls, but.” Chanyeol wrinkles his nose. “I hate it when they go all up in my face. The thought of being with them makes me nauseous.”

Kyungsoo rolls his eyes. “How kind of you.”

“Just wait ‘til you get your balls handed to you by a city girl,” Chanyeol says darkly. “It’s not a nice feeling. And, and—how am I supposed to know what they want when they won’t tell me directly? I didn’t sign up to work with some World War II code breaking-level bullshit!”

“Well. You can be an asshole sometimes, Park Chanyeol-ssi. So that just means you have to let go being an asshole in order to date properly,” Kyungsoo intones. “And I say this without a hint of irony. Times have changed.”

“Did you hand out dating advice every now and then while I was gone?” Chanyeol says irritably. “Crazy punk. You’ve never even left this place.”

Kyungsoo decides to take Chanyeol’s sudden turn in mood in stride. “Look. My mom’s from Seoul,” he says simply. “She thinks differently from Dad, who’s from here. That’s why—” Kyungsoo pauses and shrugs. “City folks are different from us country folk. It’s just how it is.”

Chanyeol grumbles an assent. “Are you thinking of marrying then?” he asks.

Kyungsoo stumbles on a jagged piece of rock on the path. “What do you mean? I don’t even have a girlfriend—”

“No, god, what is this? I’m just _saying_. You still think about marrying?” Chanyeol’s expression is serious. “If you do meet someone, would you marry that person?”

Kyungsoo hopes Chanyeol forgives him for taking more than a minute to answer properly. It’s a huge question to answer, and he’s already had a version of it thrown his way a long time ago; he tries to recall what his answer was that time. “I, uh—I respect marriage, and all it entails,” he says diplomatically. “But when I apply it to _myself_, I don’t think it’s for me. I don’t really have time to date with all the work in the farm. It’ll be kind of unfair to the both of us....” He then shrugs. “But I don’t know. What if I meet someone? What if this person wants to be with me in that way? I might think about it. I suppose... what I’m trying to say is—”

“You’re leaving it up in the air,” Chanyeol says. “You don’t want it, at least not right now. But if you do _need_ it...”

Kyungsoo chuckles stiltedly. “I guess you do understand what I’m trying to say.”

Chanyeol’s expression remains impassive. “Well it is _you_ we’re talking about here.”

Something about his statement made Kyungsoo’s skin prickle. “So what about you then? Are you dating just for the sake of dating or with the end goal of marriage in mind?”

“Eh. I’ll just copy your answer.” Chanyeol’s grin is all teeth. “It seemed like a good one.”

Kyungsoo smirks. “Punk.”

...

When they arrive at the village, the sun is high in the sky, but it’s still agonizingly cold that they have to move around the place, exertion keeping them warm enough. Kyungsoo nods at the villagers who wave him hello; some people he knows, having personally met them when they came to Seoltang to buy his sugar and other produce.

Chanyeol is hitting himself up with a jovial man selling passion fruit cocktail and rice wine. “_Ahh_, drinking yourself silly in the wild—there’s nothing quite like it, I should say!” says the man. “You have your grandfather’s spirit, m’boy!”

“Don’t let my mom hear you say that, or else she’d like to have a word with you,” Chanyeol says brightly. “She’d say it’d be more of ‘stupidity’ or ‘recklessness’. The one thing I got from my ‘good-for-nothing’ father.”

“Oh, I definitely won’t refuse a word if she bids! You can’t keep a man from being a man!” He laughs once more. “You can have this _makgeolli_, it’s on me.” He winks. “And don’t tell my wife I said anything about Gildong-ssi. She’ll throw a fit.”

Chanyeol winks back as he walks away. Kyungsoo tries to fight back a scoff.

“You’ve been busy,” Kyungsoo comments.

“You call it _fraternizing_, whilst I call it _networking_,” Chanyeol says breezily, waving his grocery bag. The glasses of alcoholic beverages inside clink loudly. “Give it up, old man. Times have changed.”

“Fuck off,” Kyungsoo says with a laugh.

Despite the cold, the children play by the brook, their howling laughter ricocheting from one tree to the next before ringing in Kyungsoo’s ears. They’re trying to see who gets the most freshwater fish with their bare hands. He finds the girl with the pale evergreen dress to be particularly charming as she tries to catch a bluegill with her teeth.

“Maybe we should have brought Jongdae along,” Chanyeol says.

Kyungsoo nods. Jongdae really likes fishing. “You thought so, too?”

Chanyeol’s gaze lingers at his face for almost a minute. “Did you want him to come with you instead of me?”

“I wanted _none_ of you, actually,” Kyungsoo teases. “I’m just saying he might have wanted to join us. You don’t think so?”

“I was the one who said it in the first place.”

Kyungsoo throws him a confused glance. “Then what are you saying exactly?”

Chanyeol’s lips thin and he shakes his head. “Nothing.”

Kyungsoo grimaces then quickly schools his expression before Chanyeol can see it. Chanyeol must be in one of those moods, where he’s feeling combative and less receptive to criticism. Chanyeol can be so damn moody sometimes, but it’s not like Kyungsoo hasn’t had years of experience in how to deal with it.

Still, they leave the village with Kyungsoo feeling a little flat-footed.

~O~

Kim Jongdae moved to the town of Seoltang seven months after Chanyeol left for Seoul. He’s around their age, and Kyungsoo couldn’t believe that a man even more ridiculous than Chanyeol had taken residence in the empty lot a few yards away from The Do’s sugar farm. He is, by all means, an odd man.

Kyungsoo doesn’t know why Jongdae left Seoul. Jongdae always changed his story whenever someone asks. He told Mrs. Lee that people chased him out of the city for hitching the wife of a powerful politician; Mr. Yu claimed that Jongdae was holed up for four years in the detention center in Uiwang; and Dr. Kim, the only physician in town, said that during one of his consults, Jongdae divulged that the metropolitan court gave him a restraining order for stalking his girlfriend and so he went up north. All were equally scandalous to be taken as truths completely, but Kyungsoo found it alarming that the residents of Seoltang had left no room for doubt.

But everyone could agree that they found Jongdae sweet and kind, and the fact that the children loved to wait by his door early morning to help him with the strawberry orchard was a testament to it. Naturally, Kyungsoo had been a bit slower on the uptake. For one, he hadn’t realized how much he came to enjoy Jongdae’s company until one time, on a dreary April afternoon, he caught himself bicycling for an hour to the town grocery store, buying an entire bag of dried shrimp and _soju_ meant for the consumption of two people.

He brought this up with Jongdae when he came over other man’s house during the weekend. Jongdae merely laughed.

“Don’t act so amazed, Kyungsoo-ssi, or I’ll be offended!” Jongdae beamed. “I am your _neighbor_. And what are you supposed to do whenever you feel lonely and need company? Cluck at your chickens?”

Kyungsoo stabbed the plastic of dried shrimp with his fork until it burst open. “I just hope I wasn’t imposing or anything...”

“You’re a ridiculous man, Do Kyungsoo-ssi, but imposing...” Jongdae said in false solemnity. “Perhaps you’ll have to try a bit harder.”

Slowly looking up, Kyungsoo returned his smile.

...

“So. The people in the town market were telling me earlier this morning... You like this Park Chanyeol person?”

Kyungsoo grimaced and tugged Jongdae’s fringe quite painfully, making the other man yelp. He smiled grimly in satisfaction. “Not in that sense,” he replied.

“So in what sense would it make perfect sense?” Jongdae rubbed at his forehead. “I’m years behind the town gossip. School me if you have to.”

Kyungsoo’s not surprised that people are talking about him and Chanyeol, especially after the way the man left. “No, I’m serious. I like Chanyeol, but not in a romantic sense.”

Jongdae laughed, stuffing his mouth full of shrimp. “All right, all right,” he said, quite disbelieving.

“It’s _true_,” Kyungsoo said around the rim of his bottle of soju. He knew it was futile convincing Jongdae. People would always see things their own way. Kyungsoo had grown tired telling others what he really thought.

“Okay. So let’s say you don’t think of Chanyeol-ssi romantically,” Jongdae said. “And Chanyeol-ssi thinks of you romantically. Or,” he adds at Kyungsoo’s leveling stare. “He thought of you that way until he left—he might be having the time of his life with some shitstain in Myeongdong. Who cares? Anyway, what is Chanyeol-ssi to you?”

Kyungsoo gulped. “A precious friend. We’ve known each other for a long time.” He gulped again. “He’s someone that keeps me from getting lonely.”

That wrenched an incredulous laugh from Jongdae. “Oh, wow. Incredible. You sure know how to keep your distance.”

Kyungsoo grimaced. It’s not that he thinks Chanyeol’s feelings for him were not at all genuine. It was not like Chanyeol had no heart to speak of: in fact, Chanyeol was all _heart_, one that Kyungsoo could never doubt. Anyone would believe Park Chanyeol loved Do Kyungsoo with all of his being—until Chanyeol changed his mind, or encountered someone wonderful, evidently superior, as was the usual for Chanyeol's restless, changeable nature, perpetually taking up and abandoning enthusiasms. And the thing is, Kyungsoo couldn't blame him.

With all that had happened in his life, Kyungsoo could not bring himself to trust anyone. Worse, Kyungsoo didn’t trust himself.

“Let me amend that,” Kyungsoo intoned, raising a finger. “He, ah, _used_ to keep me from getting lonely. But now he’s gone.”

Jongdae nodded sagely. From the glazed look in his eyes, he was quite drunk. “Now he’s gone,” he repeated.

“So now I turn to you for company,” Kyungsoo supplied.

“Or you turn to the chickens.”

“Right. Or the chickens.”

“And the cows!”

“The cows, yeah.”

Jongdae chuckled to himself. “So am I a good enough replacement? Oh, wait. Don’t answer that. With all your years of history... what was I even thinking?” He laughed again.

Kyungsoo took a piece of lettuce from the silver tray and chewed on it morosely. “We shouldn’t be talking about this, Jongdae-ssi,” he mumbled. He then pinched the back of his neck to relieve a nagging pressure there.

“Why is that?”

“I don’t know. I can’t come up with a reason because I’m drunk right now—” At that, Jongdae guffawed, “But I have this feeling that we shouldn’t talk about this.”

“Why? Because it’s too personal? Am I overstepping?”

“No. Not really. I’m a little...” It was like trying to run away against a current; Kyungsoo’s brain was failing to pull through. “I’m just... I am not exactly lovable. You know?”

Jongdae tutted loudly. His hand slipped, and some shrimp fell on both their laps. “Kyungsoo-ssi, Kyungsoo-ssi! Enough with the pity party—you’re more than that. You know that’s not true at all!”

Kyungsoo cracked a stale smile. Did the truth really matter? It’s what Kyungsoo had come to believe, and it’s what he felt that mattered in the end. He could hardly change his heart about these things.

“You’re—whaddya call it?—_thinking_! You’re super thinking. Overthinking. Right. Kyungsoo-ssi, I will have to ask you to stop doing that,” Jongdae slurred. “You’re thinking more than you’re feeling, is what I’m getting here. Why would you do that?”

“Because I’m a person?”

Jongdae shook his head. “A _cruel_ person. A cruel person to yourself,” he stressed. He took a gulp from his bottle and hissed. "You’re supposed to... you know. Strike a balance between those two. Thinking. Feeling.”

“I know myself,” Kyungsoo said steadfastly. “And I know I wouldn’t love—or _like_ myself—even if I were given a next chance in life.” He eyed Jongdae blearily. “Would you like yourself in another lifetime?”

“Who would _want_ another lifetime?” Jongdae retorted. “Two lifetimes is just one too many.”

Kyungsoo couldn’t help but laugh at that. “You didn’t answer my question, you sneak.” He threw a wad of wet lettuce at Jongdae’s face. “Quit fielding my questions and stop being a hypocrite.”

Jongdae rolled his eyes and smirked. “You think it might be presumptuous of me to say so, since we hadn’t known each other for a long time—not like this Park Chanyeol guy Gosuk _ahjumma_ always gushes about—but you’re one of the most lovable guys I know, Kyungsoo-ssi. Honest! And bar that, you’re one of the most loving as well.” He then scrunched his nose. “But perhaps not the most romantic.”

“Perhaps not.”

“The _blandest_ sugar farmer in sugar town! It’s crazy.”

“Well, I don’t like sweets.”

Jongdae snorted. “Ah. That explains it.”

Kyungsoo threw him a withering look.

Jongdae holds out his bottle of _soju_ in a toast, signalling the end to the conversation, which Kyungsoo took gratefully. “You, my strange fellow, are a coward,” he said. “But who’s a person without fear?”

Kyungsoo mimicked his sly smile. “You?”

“No way! I have a couple, of course.”

Kyungsoo accused, “You hardly open yourself up for discussion.”

Jongdae laughed. “Without my mystery, people won’t talk to me at all. And so would you.” He twirled his right hand in the air. “You know how it is out here, being twenty-two with no family and friends. Everyone has a gimmick.”

Kyungsoo knew very well. “There’s _soju_,“ he said.

“There’s _soju_,” Jongdae agreed wholeheartedly.

~O~

For a change of pace, they stayed by the river bank. The sky is getting dark. Kyungsoo opens his phone and shines a light over the river, transforming the streaming waters into a mirror. He blinks at the traveler’s weariness he finds in his own reflection.

He and Chanyeol suddenly meet eyes, and on reflex, Kyungsoo lowered his gaze. Somehow, it feels wrong to look his way again.

They start setting up camp. The tall reed blades creates an illusion of separation, and so they go about their own business. He tries to focus on getting the fire started; it’s been failing spectacularly for the last fifteen minutes.

Suddenly, his dad’s voice pops in his head like a reverb, _My word, my little Kyungsoo is very focused, isn’t he?_ He then hears an airy laugh. _You really never let anyone get in your way from things. Why, you’re just like your mother._

Kyungsoo shakes his head violently. _Please stay out of my head, Dad_, he pleads.

His dad’s laughter echoes still, and Kyungsoo washes his face multiple times with river water until his thoughts turn clear again.

An hour or so later, he stares after Chanyeol setting up the tent. Something in his stomach bubbles unpleasantly.

Jongdae was wrong about him. Kyungsoo has always been thoughtless and selfish and mean, and now, perhaps he should do what he should’ve done since Chanyeol returned.

The light out in the mountains shines over Chanyeol’s face and Kyungsoo’s chest tightens. He walks over to Chanyeol.

“Hey, uhh.” Kyungsoo cleared his throat. “I think we should talk.”

Chanyeol turns and gives him a flat stare.

“Right,” Kyungsoo says. “Earlier today, did I say or do anything that might have, ah, made you upset? Was I being...” He painstakingly searched for the right word. “Insensitive?”

A shiver of cold runs down Kyungsoo’s back when he takes in Chanyeol’s stormy expression. It magnifies the sounds of the river and the rustling of the leaves against the twilight wind as Kyungsoo waited for Chanyeol’s response with bated breath.

“No,” Chanyeol says finally with a sigh. “It’s not your fault.” It looks like he wants to continue; Kyungsoo waits again. “You never really tell me the things that I want to hear,” he then says. “Sometimes, that’s just what I needed the most.”

Kyungsoo glances at him apprehensively. “I’m not sure I quite follow...”

“I like you,” Chanyeol says. “But you don’t like me, not that way. But five years ago you asked me to never leave your side.”

Kyungsoo tries not to visibly balk at his words. “Chanyeol...”

“It’s fine. I don’t want to, either,” Chanyeol says. “It’s an arrangement we’re both happy with, and we’re fucking adults now. We can always work something out that’s good for the both of us, can’t we? Something functional? Nothing too unsavory or unhinged?”

Chanyeol takes a deep breath when his voice begins to shake. “What I’m trying to say is, Kyungsoo... I feel frustrated and pathetic. On my end. I just—I feel like screaming. I’m trying to figure myself out because right now I feel so _unwanted_—” He bites his lip. “And it’s not... it's not your fault, Kyungsoo. It’s _not_. It doesn’t happen every day, but sometimes, I just can’t help but feel a little sad for myself.”

Kyungsoo’s stomach sinks. No matter how much he wants to walk over to Chanyeol’s side, he stays unmoving, his thoughts of shame and inadequacy and sadness morphing into one impressive force chaining him down to the ground. He has no comforting words to offer, and he feels utterly sick of himself.

Chanyeol smiles; he doesn’t even attempt to make it reach his eyes. “Just let me sleep on it,” he says with forced lightness. “I don't want to talk about this anymore, alright? I already know how you feel. I know what you're going to say. And it's not your fault." He swallows. "I’ll be fine tomorrow. Don’t wake me for dinner cause I’m not hungry.” He sharply turns his back, and the conversation is effectively over.

~O~

Kyungsoo’s back aches when he wakes up the next morning. He hasn’t slept well, despite the exhaustion and the cool, evening landscape promising a good night’s rest. He rolls up his sleeping bag and tucks his windbreaker in between the folds. Yawning, he crouches by the riverside to wash his face.

To his surprise, Chanyeol’s awake and only a few feet away from him. He’s rolled up his pants up to his knees and dipped his legs into the river, lost in thought.

Kyungsoo debates with himself before settling himself beside his friend. Chanyeol’s shoulders tightens briefly before relaxing when a minute passes and Kyungsoo hasn’t uttered a word between them. Kyungsoo lets the contemplative silence embrace them for a good while, until he feels the danger of the thunderstorm come to pass, and it’s time for him to roam again, to be honest.

“When you left, I hadn’t been able to get out of town for longer than two hours,” Kyungsoo starts. From his periphery, he sees Chanyeol’s head bob up. “It’s been years since I went on a trip. I don’t know why, though. I think I told myself I didn’t have the time. “ He inhales deeply. “I thought to myself, I wasn’t like you.”

Chanyeol grunts in reply.

“It’s not like I had nothing to do. I had _loads_ to do, of course. Still have.” Farming is not an easy vocation, despite what everyone else thinks. “But lately, I’ve been feeling...” Kyungsoo grimaces, struggling to name the emotion.

“Tired?” Chanyeol prompts, his voice hoarse. “Discontented?”

“No,” Kyungsoo admits. He stares at the rusty lamp post across the bridge, the perfect picture of stillness, and that’s when it hits him: “Idle.” He shuts his eyes.

They fall silent again.

“I don’t think it’s the first time I felt like this,” Kyungsoo mutters. “I think, you know, if someone lives the way like we do, it’s bound to happen. When you left, I started having these thoughts more often, but now you’re back. And for some reason, I feel even more dissatisfied with myself.” He turns to look at Chanyeol. “I suppose that’s why I’m slightly envious of you for having a taste of Seoulite life.”

Chanyeol makes a face. “It wasn’t all that glamorous.”

Kyungsoo grins. “Maybe not. But still, I wonder...”

For twenty-nine years, Kyungsoo, has lived in Seoltang-myeon; he wanders, but never far, only to the peripheries, into the lush forests, to the amiable villages, and by the slow-moving rivers. He likes the people and he loves the hush. He doesn’t think he’ll ever want a life unlike this, but then the season for climbing hillsides would come, and the accompanying breeze whispering a spell to his heart would prove hard to shake off. Just like the fresh spring greens, just like a passing dream, a burst of passion would sprout from within him, and then he’d start to question the choices he’s made so far. Sometimes, he’d think he’s losing himself, and that he needs to go somewhere alone to recover a piece of it. Maybe it’s similar to what Jongdae and Chanyeol felt. Maybe it’s what his dad felt.

Except right now, Kyungsoo’s not alone. To his surprise, he finds that he didn’t want to, and he’s glad he’s not. Chanyeol must have caught on early. He usually does.

“You didn’t miss out much,” Chanyeol says, breaking Kyungsoo’s reverie. He then groans. “If you wanted to go to Seoul, why didn’t you just _say_ so? I’m still in contact with a few friends I made there. I would have arranged something for us!”

Kyungsoo becomes harried, unsure where the conversation has gotten. “I wasn’t really planning for some sudden excursion to Seoul. I just thought...” Then, he laughs. He can’t recall exactly what he was thinking when he decided to go away from the farm for a while.

“You do realize you sound totally crazy right now, don’t you?” Chanyeol says, a hint of a smile now on his face. Kyungsoo feels silly for being relieved at the sight of it.

“What? I can’t indulge in a little craziness?” Kyungsoo laughs again. He flicks the other’s arm. “I know I'm basically repeating myself, but thanks. Thanks for being here, Chanyeol.”

Chanyeol, for once, just smiles tinily in reply.

...

As if they’ve come about some form of truce this morning, Chanyeol is surprisingly docile for the rest of the day. In hindsight, it might not have been a fair enough exchange—an otherwise mild existential rumination in return for Chanyeol’s hefty confession, but it wasn’t meaningless. Kyungsoo had been staring up the stars all night, deciding whether it would be right to share what he felt; it was an excruciating process.

They explore the nearby church ruins Chanyeol had wanted to see before becoming ultimately bored with it and settling back again by the river bank. They take turns cleaning the mushrooms, soaking them repeatedly in the river until the soil is washed away. Chanyeol lights a fire and Kyungsoo makes rice and wild oyster stew. They share it over small shots of soju and clementines. They hold a contest on who could throw the fruit skin the farthest.

Chanyeol’s mom calls just when they started throwing the clementine skins at each other. She showers Kyungsoo with warmth and regard, and left all the reproach and fussing for her only son.

“You know, I don’t think my mom actually calls to talk to me just as much as she wants to talk to you,” Chanyeol grumbles, discarding his phone to the side.

“Your mom _does_ like me more than you,” Kyungsoo replies offhandedly.

Chanyeol slaps Kyungsoo’s thigh. “Now, just because she thinks I’m a total coxcomb...” he says, sounding almost annoyed.

“Well, she doesn’t exactly make it a secret, does she?” Kyungsoo says. Contrite, he then adds, “Damn, you’re so easy to tease. You’re just thinking that on your own. A mother thinks the world of her son.”

Chanyeol scoffs. “You make it sound like you’re a mother yourself.”

“Because Mother talks to me about her feelings, and I listen well.”

“What a filial son.”

“I try,” Kyungsoo says dryly. “Well, you know... I’ve always wanted to be... er. A good son.” He barely stops from cringing at himself. He feels a little shy admitting it. “I don’t like giving my parents any trouble.”

“You were—are the perfect son! Through and through!”

Kyungsoo eyes him sidelong. “You’re not making fun of me now, are you?”

“Nah. I’m just saying. If I were to have a son, I hope he’d be just like you.”

Kyungsoo laughs out loud. “That’s so weird of you to say!” he manages in between splutters.

The good mood last for the entirety of the day. The autumn grass makes for a comfortable surface to lay upon, with or without the sleeping bag, and there is ample shade from the pillowy clouds above from the sun. Kyungsoo gives Chanyeol his continued gratitude for finding this place for them to pass the time. When the afternoon horizon begins to show, Chanyeol confesses that he must be back to Seoltang-myeon by tomorrow morning. Kyungsoo, mildly disappointed, divulges he knows a quick trail back to their town, but they’ll have to cross a dusty path through several farm lands to get there. It will not be a good way to bookend their trip, but they concede that they’ve been away from the fields for far longer than they’ve intended.

Chanyeol complains as he rinses his metal lunch box with river water, “I feel bruised to the bone.”

“Let me just put this out there again: I didn’t ask you to come with me,” Kyungsoo says tepidly.

Chanyeol rolls his eyes at him. “Will you hear me out for minute?” he says. “My body aches in places I don’t think I can even name, but I definitely won’t refuse to go around this part of the country in this way again.” He stretches his back and lets out a satisfied whine. “Is this why you and your dad liked backpacking around so much when we were kids?”

“I don’t remember exactly,” Kyungsoo half lies. “I’m glad you liked it, though.” He then looks up and narrows his eyes at Chanyeol. “Don’t tell me this is going to be a regular thing for us to—“

Chanyeol chortles. “You’re such a scrooge. Don’t worry! Even if your lazy ass is not up for it, I’ll be making sure this becomes a regular thing,” he says with a wink, and Kyungsoo can only shake his head in resignation.

When night falls, they keep themselves toasty beside the small campfire, _soju_ on one hand, a bag of corn chips on the other. They’ve only had a sparse dinner—mushroom soup and rice once again—and for some reason, the both of them thought it’ll be a good idea to engorge themselves with the remaining alcohol Chanyeol got as a bribe the other day. If they were in uniforms and there were other officers, Kyungsoo would have thought he was back in the army, sitting on the open ground, drinking and complaining about celebrities and playing cards.

“Do you think I would have made a good actor?” Chanyeol says, peering into his half-empty bottle as if he could will itself to become full again.

“No,” Kyungsoo says honestly. “I think you would have been a better idol. Or a band player. You’re good with instruments.”

Chanyeol is quiet for a moment, and then he says, “I was scouted, actually. When I came to Seoul.” At Kyungsoo’s wide eyes, he adds, “I didn’t make it past auditions. They say I have too much—” He wrinkles his nose. “Earthy-ness in me. Or was it fire?” He shrugs. “I don’t know, I—I couldn’t make out what they were saying exactly. Just that I wasn’t wanted. I wasn’t what they wanted.”

Kyungsoo makes a sympathetic noise. “Think about it this way,” he says. “I’m pretty sure those judges would be useless on a mount. Imagine them hanging by the reins on a creature as mild as Webbi—”

“Webbi’s not a _mild_ horse, even if she’s bred for a phaeton—”

“Not with the way you handle her,” Kyungsoo interjects and hands him another bottle. “You’re a product of the land here, and they over there. Even if you’re not what they’re looking for, it doesn’t make you of any lesser value, you know.” He then throws Chanyeol a wicked look. “Though I do think you need to remember once in a while how terrible a dancer you are.”

Chanyeol shuts his eyes tightly and groans as he presses his face against the cool soju bottle. “Telling me just what I needed the most,” he mumbles. “Jongdae did say I need to have a healthy sense of self.”

Kyungsoo raises his bottle in declaration, the light from the fire winking off the glass. “I’ll never forget to remind you of your faults,” he says wryly.

“Very likely. I know how much of your amusement comes from them,” Chanyeol says. “That’s why I’m here. Thank you, Kyungsoo.”

Kyungsoo blinks at him. “What?”

Chanyeol also gives him a confused look. “I said thank you.”

“No, I mean...” Kyungsoo shakes his head. Bad idea: his vision spins. When he recovers, he asks again, “What did you mean, ‘thank you’?”

“I just said thank you. As in, really. You’re actually the only person who has stayed by my side,” Chanyeol mumbles. “And I don’t think I’ve thanked you for that. _Ever_. So I am.”

“By coming backpacking with me?”

Chanyeol shrugs.

After a minute of quiet incredulity, Kyungsoo snorts powerfully the sound echoes through the wilderness. “There are other ways to say thank you, Park Chanyeol.” He looks down on his lap. “Besides, you don’t have to. _Really_.”

“I am not exactly the best person to be around,” Chanyeol says once again, as if Kyungsoo hadn’t spoken. “I’m amazing, of course, but my faults are—” He clears his throat. “I annoy people a lot.”

Kyungsoo almost smiles. “You do.”

“I annoy you.”

He scoffs. “You _really_ do.”

“And yet... you’re really the only person who’s been with me,” Chanyeol says in a low voice, his face in shadow.

“There’s no obligation on my side,” Kyungsoo says, cheeks growing warm. Despite his drunkenness, this side of Chanyeol he recognizes instantly. Where in a sense of ache and recklessness, Chanyeol will speak so freely about what he thinks he can fend off no longer. Kyungsoo wishes he has the right to comfort him. It used to be easy before. As usual, things grow to become complicated.

But in times Chanyeol believes the things he says matters no longer, Kyungsoo can’t help but feel otherwise. Kyungsoo’s mom has a longstanding theory that their brains must run on different wavelengths, yet still, _still _they meet, no matter how far their frequencies may range. That’s why they’re best of friends. That's why they won’t ever be alone since they have each other.

“Well, you really are annoying. You can be rude and childish. You have a gazillion other faults,” Kyungsoo says. “But it doesn’t... it doesn’t bother me.”

After a beat of silence, Chanyeol repeats, “Bother?”

“Yeah,” Kyungsoo affirms, trusting in candor to carry them home. “It doesn’t.”

“Why?”

Kyungsoo’s lips thin. “I don’t... know,” he says, bewildered at Chanyeol, at himself, at where this conversation is going, as is standard with drunken conversations with his friend. Perhaps Kyungsoo should have seen this coming. “I’m just not bothered.”

“You can’t not have a reason.” As always, Chanyeol is obstinate.

“Maybe it’s because we’ve known each other since we were kids.” Kyungsoo sighs. “Well... it’s just who you are. Who’s perfect, anyway?”

Chanyeol quiets.

“I’m not bothered by anything you do. I’ve never been bothered by your _anything_. That’s why... that’s why I can be on your side,” Kyungsoo mumbles. “So you really don’t have to go out of your way to thank me.”

“But you get pissed at me.”

“I _do_ get pissed. I just said that,” Kyungsoo says. “Are you getting too drunk? Stop saying useless things. Even _you_ get pissed at me.”

Chanyeol chuckles softly. “Sorry.”

Kyungsoo stares at him. “Do you think I can put up with someone who irritates me all the time? Do _you_?”

“Not really...”

“If I’ve ever been bothered by you, then I wouldn't have been so angry that you left the town years ago.” Kyungsoo frowns. “And I wouldn't have been so happy when you came back. _Dummy_.”

Chanyeol scrunches his face, as if giving it some deep, intense thought. Kyungsoo is torn between sleeping off the whole thing and laughing himself hoarse, despite his best intentions.

Chanyeol, in a high, hiccup-y voice, announces, “I don’t really wish to cause awkwardness—”

“Wow, you _don’t_, huh—”

“You’re really!” Chanyeol shouts again. A good amount of _soju_ spills over the campfire. "_Really_! The only person! The only person who has stood by my side. The only person. Truly!”

Kyungsoo can feel his ears burn. “You shouldn’t say it like that, jeez—”

“Really!” Chanyeol exclaims. He then laughs again and stumbles over his drink. “I’m lucky I have you.” He drapes himself over the empty pan they used to cook mushrooms with. He then begins to breathe heavily, completely dead to the world in a matter of seconds.

Kyungsoo sighs. Park Chanyeol is so loud and unpredictable and dear and _absurd_.

He sighs again and closes his eyes. “I’m lucky I have you too,” Kyungsoo says out loud, this time, without a care of who hears. He throws Chanyeol his sleeping bag and lets the both of them rest.

~O~

"You know.”

“Huh?”

“Jongdae once told me—love, not romance.”

“What?” Chanyeol buckles the straps of his backpack around his waist. “I don’t get it.”

Kyungsoo nods to himself. “Never mind then.”

~Fin~


End file.
